mgo.licio.us

"The face of the operation is Briatore (referred to exclusively in the film by his colleagues and angry, chanting detractors as "Flavio"), an anthropomorphic radish who spends most of his time at QPR plotting to fire all of the managers."

At press time, Harbaugh had sent Michigan’s athletic department an envelope containing a heavily annotated seating chart, a list of the 63,000 seat views he had found unsatisfactory, and a glowing 70-page report on section 25, row 12, seat 9, which he claimed is “exactly what the great sport of football is all about.”

So then who from the WCHA is left that BG, LSSU, UAF, WMU & Ferris are joining?

I know Alaska-Anchorage is there. Who else?

"Michigan man or woman. To me, it's a great love for the University of Michigan. There's a selflessness there. It's what can you do for the University of Michigan, not what the Universtiy of Michigan can do for you." JH

Sad the CCHA is going the way of the do-do BUT essentially two conferences (WCHA and CCHA) have now begat three (Big Ten, the revamped WCHA and the West-of-the-Mississippi-Non-Big-Ten-but-too-good-to-be-WCHA Super Conference)

"Michigan man or woman. To me, it's a great love for the University of Michigan. There's a selflessness there. It's what can you do for the University of Michigan, not what the Universtiy of Michigan can do for you." JH

Seeing Western in the list made me think ND had reached a decision due to their paring in the NCHC rumors. But after re-reading, I realized these are invitations to the WCHA and not acceptance. It will be interesting to see if Western accepts.

The fact that they haven't made a decision yet, which doesn't seem it should take that long, and the reemergence of realignment has gotten me to waste time speculating about B1G things. I know, unlikely.

As much as certain people hyped the B1G Ten Hockey conferences formation, it was undoubtedly a bad thing for college hockey as a whole. Mathematically, certain teams are simply going to be left out of conference reformation and close up shop. Even schools that get absorbed into other conferences (Western, for example) are going to face economic crisis not having the same number of home games against the NDs and Michigans of the world.

"Here we are at Ohio Stadium, in front of 10,000 alumni and 74,000 truck drivers." - Bob Ufer

That's only one aspect of it. Another is that teams that play against B1G teams will get television exposure they wouldn't get in the past. The same might be said of the other new conference if ESPN or another network decide to pick up those games. That will give college hockey a big boost in viewership and interest, which will probably help spur more schools to create hockey programs. Obviously, certain schools will hurt in the meantime, but it's not all doom and gloom.

I think this is probably the best outcome under the circumstances, though. Some things now make sense geographically (both Alaska schools in one conference, for example), and with guaranteed games against B1G schools and others, they'll be ok financially.

These schools may not be perrenial powerhouses, but each has a storied tradition and there are a couple a national championships among these schools. To compare these hockey programs to the CUSA would be an insult. Im glad they were picked up by a major conference and I hope to see these teams at Yost for many years to come! The new WCHA will not be a pushover conference come tourney time!

While C-USA is now "just another mid-major" in football, for a long time it was like what the Mountain West was so recently - a strong mid-major, just one step removed from the big boys. I still think of them that way, what with Tulane and ECU holding it down. And to me, the new WCHA is this - a strong college hockey conference. Maybe not a powerhouse, but a strong conference nonetheless.